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| During the last decades of growing scientific, political and public attention to global climate change, it
has become increasingly clear that the present and projected impacts from climate change, and the
ability adapt to the these changes, are not evenly distributed across the globe. This paper investigates
whether the need for knowledge on climate changes in the most vulnerable regions of the world is met
by the supply of knowledge measured by scientific research publications from the last decade. A
quantitative analysis of more than 15,000 scientific publications from 197 countries investigates the
distribution of climate change research and the potential causes of this distribution. More than 13
explanatory variables representing vulnerability, geographical, demographical, economical and
institutional indicators are included in the analysis. The results show that the supply of climate
change knowledge is biased toward richer countries, which are more stable and less corrupt, have higher
school enrolment and expenditures on research and development, emit more carbon and are less
vulnerable to climate change. Similarly, the production of knowledge, analyzed by author affiliations, is
skewed away from the poorer, fragile and more vulnerable regions of the world. A quantitative keywords
analysis of all publications shows that different knowledge domains and research themes dominate
across regions, reflecting the divergent global concerns in relation to climate change. In general, research
on climate change in more developed countries tend to focus on mitigation aspects, while in developing
countries issues of adaptation and human or social impacts (droughts and diseases) dominate. Based on
these findings, this paper discusses the gap between the supply of and need for climate change
knowledge, the potential causes and constraints behind the imbalanced distribution of knowledge, and
its implications for adaptation and policymaking. | |
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